


Vienna in Winter

by tipitiwitchet (no_one_in_particular)



Category: Vampire Chronicles - Anne Rice
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2012-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-22 11:02:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/609126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/no_one_in_particular/pseuds/tipitiwitchet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis tells a part of his story he hasn't told before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vienna in Winter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kassidy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kassidy/gifts).



> _My bestie and I decided to have our own private holiday exchange this year, and this is what I wrote for her. I wasn't going to post it, but when I gave it to her she asked that I do so, and I always like to give her what she wants when I can : ) Especially since she gave me a such a lovely story as well. This is the prompt she gave me:_
> 
>  
> 
> _Vampire Chronicles books - any of these ideas: Louis and Claudia kill Lestat. What if Louis can't stand what's been done and goes after Lestat in the swamp, lets him drink, holes up with him, possibly fucks him when Lestat's not so powerful anymore?_  
>  _or something about Louis and Claudia in the years after Lestat is "dead" -  
>  ___  
>  _or Lestat/Louis - something from that scene where Lestat goes and gets the prostitutes and kills them in front of Louis, maybe you could do a thing where Lestat screws Louis, starts out by forcing him but he ends up surrendering to it -_  
>  _so what I'm saying here is basically, anything with Louis, preferably angsty shit - he is my favorite character:_

Lestat called me a liar. I'm willing to admit, now that I know his tale, that my recollections are colored by my own desires and expectations, that my truth is not the only truth. The things he and I wanted from each other and ourselves and the world were so very different. Lestat has a truth all his own and he has every right to it. That fact doesn't diminish my own truth.

It's important to separate facts and truth.  They aren't the same thing. Still, without knowing why, Lestat was right. I did lie, mainly through omission, but also in the relating of certain events. I didn't lie about my time with Lestat and my dear lost Claudia. I told the truth as best I knew it about those years and how they ended. Lestat wouldn't know about my lie as he wasn't there for it, only Claudia, and she only knew some of it. She had her own truth, too.

The first part of the lie was that we did not go to Vienna. I told the boy that we decided to go directly to Paris, that Claudia wanted it, but that was not true. For all that I laid myself and my history bare before that boy and his recording apparatus and, through them, the world, I did not share Vienna with him or with anyone until now. I had no good reason for keeping it out of the story except that I did not wish to share it, to share Josef.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. After our travels through Eastern Europe, Claudia and I went to Vienna. It was a relief to be in a city again, out of the villages and wild countryside, away from the revenants we had found in those places. We spent several nights when we first arrived going to galleries and performances, shopping and sight-seeing.  We were city creatures and even though Vienna's chill wasn't anything like the balmy weather of New Orleans, there was comfort being back in a metropolitan area.

 Once she was comfortable in the city, Claudia pulled away from me. She was quiet when we were together and spent more and more time away, hunting alone. I think she was trying to determine if she could possibly exist on her own. There were nights when she didn't come back to the hotel, and I shut myself in my coffin trying to imagine what crypt or basement she had found for shelter. I swallowed my terror that she would leave me behind and let her do as she willed. It was the least of what I owed her, and if she wished to leave me, I knew I couldn't stop her.

I wandered Vienna by myself. I hunted. I waited for her to come to whatever decision she was going to make. Vienna was a fine place to brood. It was winter and stormy and the city was old. The wind howled down the alleys, and the snow blew around the stone buildings. Vienna was a city of ghosts and I was just another shade wandering its streets.

I frequented low establishments, dark rooms and rough company. It made hunting easier. There was always some rough thug who marked me as an easy target and would follow me to a nearby alley in hopes of robbing me or even some drunk asleep in a dim corner. It was in one of these places that I found Josef.

He sat alone, his dark head bent over the stack of papers on the table as he scribbled and mumbled to himself, stopping only to rake his hand through his unruly black hair or to take a swallow from the tankard at his elbow. At first, I merely thought him mad, but I found him fascinating just the same. He had more animation, more life, within him than I had seen in some time.

I purchased two mugs of Glühwein from the bartender and sat down at his table. He didn't even notice I was there until I set the mug down on the table next to his papers. I must have startled him because he looked up suddenly, his dark eyes wide, a smear of ink across his cheekbone.

I lifted my mug in his direction and smiled. "Please, don't let me interrupt. I just thought you might like something warm to drink."

He took a moment to consider me, then lifted the mug and sipped at it, returning my smile with one of his own. "My apologies and my thanks. My manners are never what they should be when I am working." He spoke in the soft, slow German of the Austrians, and he looked at me through his lashes as though shy.

I started to get up. "I am the one who should apologize. I've disturbed your work."

He reached out and laid  a hand over my own. "No, please. Stay. Don't let me chase you away. I would truly enjoy the company."

I leaned back into the chair and asked him what his work was to so consume him. He was a writer and he told me of his work over the next few hours. He wanted to write fantasies and dreams and truth. He told me about heroes and villains and impossible creatures. I purchased more Glühwein for him, but he didn't seem to notice that mine sat and grew cold. He spun tales for me and I allowed myself to be carried away and to forget my melancholy as I listened.

I spent hours listening to him, but the night eventually had to end. We walked outside together and stood outside the door to say our goodbyes. He was wearing a threadbare shirt and no coat, and I insisted that he take mine. He resisted, but I told him that I had more coats than I needed, and it was true. The cold didn't affect me. I felt it, but it was neither unpleasant nor debilitating. Coats were just for show. Josef, however, needed protection from the cold and his delight with the gift was obvious. The coat hung a bit loose on him -- he was more slender than I, but it was warm and practically new. He embraced me and thanked me effusively and made me promise to come back the next night to see him again.

I had no intention of keeping that promise. I did not plan to return or seek him out, but Claudia stayed away, and I felt my loneliness even more keenly than before my evening with the young writer. I told myself I should not cultivate any further relationship with him, but I still found myself returning to the tavern that night.

Josef was standing outside and he smiled as he saw me approach. "I was afraid I would not see you."

A weight inside me lifted when I saw him, and I raised my hand in greeting. "I was detained, but I'm here now. Shall we have a drink?"

Josef shook his head. "The crowd is especially rough tonight. It's too loud to think, never mind talk. Would you like to take a walk? Is it too cold?"

I assured him it was not, and we set off. The night air was brisk, but Josef didn't seem to mind it, so we walked and talked. Josef was as compelling a speaker as he had been the night before, but he tried now to draw me out from time to time. He kept asking questions about me, wanting to know my history. I deflected his questions and steered the conversation to other topics. Josef seemed to be interested in everything, to want to know everything.

The hour grew later and we passed fewer and fewer people until we heard only the echo of our own steps. I was beginning to worry about keeping Josef out in the cold when he stepped off the street and drew me under a stone archway. I was puzzled by this for a moment, naively I suppose, before he took hold of my lapels and drew me closer for a kiss. Kissing was a faint memory for me, but I responded eagerly enough. He was warmth and light and life, and I wanted to be closer to him, wanted to give him what he wanted.

He pulled away and leaned back against the stone wall. He stroked his hand down my face and whispered, " What are you? Are you an angel?"

I didn't correct him. If he wanted to believe I was an angel, I would let him. Instead of answering, I pulled my gloves off and kissed him again before unbuttoning his coat so I could reach under his shirt and touch his skin. He arched into my touch and moaned.  He was beautiful, his head rolling back against the stone as he murmured my name. His fists tightened in my lapels as I reached into his trousers and took him in hand, iron-hard and hot. It had been too long since I had done this to myself, but the rhythm of it is a primal thing that I had not lost in the transition from human to vampire, and I picked it up soon enough.

He went rigid, and and I put my free hand over his mouth to stifle his cry as I felt him spill over my fist. I watched his face and continued to gently stroke him until he was spent and started to slide to the ground. I released him and stood over him, smiling and wiping my hand on my coat as he looked up at me, pleasure-drunk and languid.

He started to unbutton my coat, but I caught his hands in my own and crouched beside him. I kissed his hands and told him that he didn't need to reciprocate.

The look of disappointment on his face was almost childlike. "I have to give you something."

I pushed a lock of hair away from his face and told him that he had given me enough, but he shook his head and started to struggle out of his coat. He tossed it aside and tore at his shirt, buttons popping free as he pulled it away from his neck. He bared his throat to me and whispered, "Please. Please, take it. I want you to do it."

He knew I was no angel. I hadn't fooled him at all. "You can't ask this. I can't hurt you."

He put his arms around me and pressed himself close. "You won't hurt me. I know you won't." He was trembling in the cold, and I opened my coat and wrapped it around him as best I could as he clung to me and continued to urge me to drink. I was no angel. I drank.

I had never drank from anyone willing before. Never had anyone given me such trust. He writhed against me and whimpered, and I felt him hard against me. I used my strength to keep him still, afraid that he would tear his own throat and he would die despite my effort to keep myself in check. I made myself stop before I took his life and pulled away to look at him. He gave me that same heavy-lidded, languorous look from before and laughed low and deep. I pressed a handkerchief to his neck and he pushed me back against the stone wall and rutted against me until he found release again.

I put his coat back on and helped him to his feet. I half-carried him through the dark streets to the building where he said he lodged. I could have carried him easily, of course, but he stubbornly refused to let me. At his doorway, he leaned into me and asked me to come inside and stay with him. I told him I could not; the sun was coming, and I had to leave him.  He pressed me for a promise that I would return the next night. I gave him his promise and meant it this time. I couldn't pretend to myself any longer that I would stay away.

We spent the next week together. Sometimes we walked or went out to eat or drink, though I did neither of course. Often we stayed in his room, in his bed. Always, we talked. I told him about places I had seen, books I had read. I stayed away from too many details about my life as a vampire. I told him nothing of Claudia or Lestat, though I did try to tell him about what it was to see as vampire, to live as one. I tried to give him the truth without too many of the facts. Never did I imply that it was possible for a human to become a vampire. I let him believe that I was as I had always been. He knew I kept things from him, but he didn't press me. I think he believed that I would tell him eventually, that there was time. He wrote stories that were obviously inspired by me, though he would only read me bits and pieces of them, uncharacteristically shy, which was as charming as his usual brashness.

I came back to my hotel shortly before dawn one night to find Claudia waiting for me. She sat with her hands folded in her lap, dirty and disheveled. I immediately fetched a basin and towels and began to clean her face and hands. She did not speak to me at first, and I asked what had happened, if she was all right.

Finally, she turned her face to me and said, "I cannot be alone."

I kissed her temple, embraced her, and told her she would not ever have to be. She wasn't comforted by this, but myself was all I had to offer. I couldn't change anything, though I would have if it had been possible. I would have given anything to give her all that she wanted.

Claudia stayed with me that day. She slept beside me in our coffin as though she hadn't been away at all. When we woke that evening, she left to hunt but promised I would see her before dawn. I kissed her good-bye and went about my own business. I hunted quickly and then tended to some errands. I arranged for a stipend for Josef. I knew that I could not keep him, that it would have to end. I would, however, leave him better off  if I could. I would supply an income, and he would have our time together to feed his work. He would be sad at our parting, but he would live and live well. He would write and he would live.

I made my way finally to his room, entering without knocking as had become my habit, but my greeting died in my throat as I entered.

Papers, bloody and torn, were thrown everywhere. The window was broken, and the wind blew them around. Josef lay across the bed, his breath a wet rattle. Claudia straddled his chest, covered in his blood, and she looked at me with challenge in her eyes.

Josef turned his head to me and gasped out, "Louis."'

Claudia took hold of his head and snapped his neck.

I wailed and fell back against the wall, landing hard on the floor. Claudia came off the bed and ran over to me. She yelled at me, said that she had watched me with him. She beat against my chest with her tiny fists and said that she wouldn't let me make another, that I couldn't just replace her.

I couldn't reply at first, frozen by grief and shock. Eventually I grabbed her and pulled her into my embrace. I stroked her hair and said I never would have made him a vampire, that I would never make anyone a vampire, and that I could never replace her. I rocked her in my arms and stared at the corpse on the bed that had been my beautiful Josef. It wasn't her fault that he was dead. It was mine.

We cleaned the room. Josef's body, his belongings, and all his work were weighted and  thrown into the frigid waters of the Danube. I watched it all sink into the icy black.

It was then that Claudia asked that we continue on to Paris. I was more than ready to be done with Vienna and made plans to leave immediately. The story after that is mostly as I told it before. There were things I omitted. Josef was a part of those arguments in Paris, though his name wasn't always spoken. I threw him in Claudia's face when she asked me to make her a new companion. It was Josef Claudia was referring to when she asked me what making love was like. She was the only one who knew about Josef, and I never told anyone else about him, not Armand, not Lestat, no one. I haven’t spoken his name in hundreds of years, but I always think of him on cold winter nights. I have never found warmth like I knew with him again.

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
